Ernie

You misread me Lightbulbetc, I believe we could have won the title a couple of times since the extraordinary 80's and I believe we can at least challenge going forward and win a cup or few along the way. That's the target isn't it? But we won't do it by employing a Hollywood manager at 10 times our salary and 100 times our player budget levels any more than we could by employing Andy Robertson, Gilmour and Lukaku. It will need a sustained period of good management, revenue from sales and Europe to fund the team, a few decent breaks in the market and a great team attitude. Idealistic I know but even after all my Dons supporting years I still live in hope!

Mr Solskjaer's salary is only the start. His second question would be how much do I get to spend in the summer? Our budget being a factor of 100/200 times lower than his would end the phone call. Not only is it a ridiculous proposition but even if he wanted to come he'd be useless dealing with free transfers, risky prospects and those who have failed at other clubs: that's the market we are dealing in.

Won't matter when 9if) next season starts if we're down the plug. I should have said I have bought mine, just an opinion but I'd really like to see us continue at a decent level and I'd be buying it anyway.

ST holders should buy early bird 20-21 season ticket. Might help.

Good question. There were plenty numpties at Pittodrie in the 80's, there are lots of numpties at all clubs and even more who don't go to the football so I don't think that's a factor. We are a long way from that quote now but we were a bit of a way from it in the day. It was and remains bit over romantic. Basically we were a good local club with a fortuitous decent board and ambitious, extremely capable manager and all that came along just before the money explosion blew all but the big players out of contention. We were that as opposed to the bunch of biscuit tin management and players who could earn more working in the fish that we had in the 60's. I usually get into trouble about this but I started going in the early 60's and I suggest the 80's Dons were an entirely different club than the 60's one never mind the difference between 1983 and 36 years later. Not saying it's always for the good (it's not!) but things change. What's more frightening for the future of the game is how far Real Madrid have come from those days. Sure they were a big team that bought the best to supplement their own but they had a history and a culture that was Spanish and a specific type of Spanishness (not my cup of tea but nevertheless ....). Now they are one of a few global franchises who will swop the world's best players and managers around season after season scooping up the bulk of the TV dosh and ensuring no challengers crop up. They are a major player in the big club cartel that have stitched the game up. They are not the romantic Real Madrid of the past.

I remember the Pearson era. Also every other joker we've had in place with few exceptions. DM is nowhere near the level of shit we've had. For sheer incompetence however it's hard to beat the 7 losses in a row in 2010 including 9-0 to the Tims and 5-0 to Hearts. Covered two management teams but really just one to blame. McInnes perceived lack of winning mentality is the reason we still have him. I think a new manager would be interesting but I accept it's a fair chance he wouldn't be any better than DM. Gamble away I say, maybe we'll fluke it. It's not the end of the world if we don't: we survived post McGee.

Enjoyed that today. Played well within our limits and although Smurn were gash that's 75% of the job in the SPFL, they were gubbed 2-0 by the huns and beat Dundee so standard 9th or below for them I suspect. GMS starred but great to see Wright play so well central midfield, it's been worth sticking in with him. He was as good as Christie today? Probably will struggle against better teams over 90mins but he does give a creative option which is valuable as opposed to being another fancy dan winger with a few tricks up your sleeve. Also, taking due cognisance of the pish opposition, all the defensive unit breezed it today. Having Logan back will be a bonus in that position and in freeing up Ball (into CM) who I think is worth a deal. Next week will be a good test of where we are.

One year loan deal with Aberdeen, one year left in his contract with Manyoo, 30k a week now and for the last 3 (or more?) years. James, James where did it all go wrong?

Personal opinion of course but I don't want someone to drop £50m in our lap so we can buy a bunch of players and pay them top whack for a few years to take on the dhims. To be frank, there's nobody in their team worth getting skint for. They would all walk in to our team of course but their nae exactly galacticos are they? The financial inequality that you quite rightly acknowledge is far worse than £50m. Unless we can trouser £100 plus million a year as per, for example Bournemouth whose turnover is £121m and are subsequently the 28th richest, by turnover, in the world with a ground capacity of 12,400, we'd still be third or fourth tier. Life is a bitch. We're not in Glasgow never mind the EPL and I'm generally pretty happy about that, we'll just have to get on with it.

Kiri... I mean if he is poached, I'd be happy for him to stay but the problem is that he is only likely to remain if he is less successful. Like our players any decent offer (from a decent team that is) will see him off. Get the system and the personnel in place to keep the club in good nick and get a manager/coach in to look after the first team fitba, if it's McInnes that's fine with me.

Rico "I think he could do much better at raging players into a frenzy for the bigger games against better teams when tactics alone aren't going to cut it, and I think that is far more an issue for him. You could switch him for Lennon and we'd tank the huns a couple of times a season but we wouldn't finish second; he doesn't have Deek's discipline." That's the key issue for me. We'd probably be happier if we had a team of lennonesque scrappers (no disrespect, I would have him as a manager) because that's the way of fitba fans but I doubt if we would be as successful, a relative concept I know c.f. Arsene Wenger. Having happily clapped a succession of sh*te mangers from Pearson via Porterfied to Patterson etc. we Dons have seen only 4, so far , who have gone against the old political paradigm that "all careers end in failure". Turnbull, Macleod, McNeil and Ferguson. Maybe McI will get poached and do the same; I hope so because we could do with a change but to deny his success is a bit odd. Meanwhile he will have to dig in and do what the aforementioned 4 didn't have to and play the free/cheap market, at about third tier England level, with the hope of finding the odd gem.

A good season spoiled by regular regular lack of fight/bottle/tactics (I know not what) against the huns and Celtic. Overall though, the market we are able to deal in is evident again and it is clear that we will be relying on frees, loans and cheap options. I'm amazed we can keep the standard up to enable 2nd place four years on the trot. If Celtic, sevco or anyone in the top three divisions in England fancy any of our targets they will get them. Makes for interesting management though!

Possibly. I'd rather keep him. I'd prefer having a slightly past his best Rooney as an option rather than some lower league no mark on a free.

He may well want to leave LADon but what I'm saying is we are talking about "letting him go" as a bit of a favour etc. but we may well have to sweeten his leaving IF the club want him to move on. He has a contract with us won't get a better one elsewhere unless Hibs/Hearts offer him a deal which may, at a stretch, be as good.

Why would he leave? He's unlikely to get a better deal anywhere else.

I really admire sportsmen/women like Roy Keane (Willie Miller springs to mind), it's a fine attitude that works for them and is sadly missing from a others. They are going to win every time they go out there and that's a given. What I admire even more is his/their capacity to believe fully in that in the next game even after they've lost. Keane is not a stupid man, he knows it's a mantra, a mindset. I like it, I believe it works but it is not really helpful in defining or measuring what success is, it's more a means to an end?

Ultimate success? For a club team that would be domestic double and the EC, everyone else is a loser in some way. Relative success? Finishing above your wage bill rating , i.e. punching above your weight, combined with making enough to get better. Ambition/expectation? For us, consistent top of the table challenge and a trophy every few seasons. Most of my time since Tommy Pearson has not been relatively successful or met my ambition/expectation! Fitba, wtf.

I think the application will be rejected and the "No to's" will be dancing in the streets of Kingsford. I ken there's not actually anybody there but Westhill and Kingswells deserve to call the shots. If only the rest of us had been so vigilant in stopping their house building all over our bonnie countryside all those years ago. Not to mention offices, supermarkets and hotels which are acceptable, apparently. What would I prefer? I'd like it all to be in the town, Pittodrie if possible. But then again I would prefer lots of stuff that I don't get, that's life, especially when it involve's a commercial enterprise. What I don't like is the No campaign (this is the second one, they just dinna like fitba!) and supporting it is a bit like voting UKIP to keep the Tories out. Sadly they will prevail (The No's and the Tories!).

I'm not sure a grudging acceptance of the full weight of the media saying it's a done deal is concomitant with hysteria but neither is getting behind the manager a quantum of clap happiness. The only facts we know are that the hun made no official offer, no official permission was given for them to approach the guy and he decided to stay rather than join the huns. The rest is conjecture. I had stuck by my view that he would be stupid to go and only thought he would in the last two or three days. What we've learned (again) is that the weegia shit storm around the cheeks is a complete pish. Nothing more than jobs for the boys, myopic speculation and entitlement. A win tonight would be good though.

Their best statement yet, and that's saying something.

Just watched the Beeb report and they couldn't find a hun slant on the statement. To be fair it reasonably accurately reported the story as is. What a pity they, and the rest, spouted so much push prior. We should have known: the hun sense of entitlement has vastly outgrown their position in the game.

He can move on from this as long as the media circus moves on. I bought into the weegia pish, a bit embarrassed, they are so f'kn pathetic with their myopic cheek worship.

It doesn't seem to matter which spiv they have in control the huns still sell 40k season tickets which is more than enough to be second in Scotland. The saving grace for us (on top of the risk of being controlled by spivs) is that they have reinforced their sense of entitlement by pishing money away all over the place. Can DM reverse this and match their league position to to their income? I'm not convinced because of the sense of entitlement the hordes display. What ifs are interesting, and we can query Milne and the board's competence all we want, but if we had been selling 40k season tickets for the last 5 years I'm pretty sure we'd have seen a better Aberdeen team on the pitch on Sunday than the two ordinary low achievers evident. They have a self destruct modus operandi, the gift that keeps on giving, do we really think that King, Murray, C1872, the hordes, the weegia etc are going to sort it out because DM is there? Presumably DM does.

Im not sure he'll even get second this season. We're on a bit of a downer following recent results but let's face it , the stupid thing about Sunday's game is that we got beaten by an ordinary team. They have players on mega bucks not playing and all kinds of shit off pitch. One poor result (0-3 to the cheeks at home?) and the rabid hordes (including SMSM) will be all over him. He has not shown any ability to handle that, his major fault as a manger IMO. Another factor is who we get in, apologies for the glimmer of optimism there but just because the weegia have discounted us doesn't mean we have to. We have a decent squad, Hivs are competent so not a given for the huns. DM to get pelters from January on and sacked one year from now. Hope his severance deal is more cast iron than our compensation apparently is, I have to backtrack somewhat: I don't see him coming back from this now although he has surprised us before. DM to turn down the huns and wiggy to sack him anyway? Probably too much to expect.

"Like Ryan Jack, DM could have departed AFC so much more gracefully" Well aye, but only if he got an offer in the first place. The key point here is the huns haven't got/dinna want to spend the money to get him formally so it's a stitch up not an offer up till now anyway.